Two security officers allegedly steal Metro bus money

Aaron Flower and Richard Heflin are charged with felony stealing. The two allegedly stole bus fare money they were responsible for transferring from one Metro facility to another

BRENTWOOD, Mo. (KMOV.com) -

Two security employees who were contracted out to Metro are charged with allegedly stealing bus fare money.

Aaron Flower, 33, and Richard Heflin have been charged with felony stealing.

The two were hired to transfer bus fare boxes from Metro's Brentwood facility to the agency's DeBaliviere Avenue garage. An internal investigation concluded money was missing from two vaults.

Brentwood police believe Flower and Heflin stole nearly $10,000. Authorities said one of the two suspects admitted to stealing up to $8,000.

Metro released the following statement to News 4:

The arrests of two contracted security guards on March 24 at the Brentwood MetroBus facility follows a lengthy and thorough investigation by Bi-State Development Agency/Metro employees. A few months ago, our new farebox system software detected a small percentage of money missing periodically from the amount we expected to collect. Since we have a closed vault system, meaning that no one has access to the fare money, we started down a checklist of possible causes and also brought in the manufacturer to review the farebox software data. Eventually, we identified that it was not a software problem but a hardware issue that was allowing limited access to two out of 26 farebox vaults. As our internal investigation continued, we were able to eliminate all personnel who had access to the vaults, except for two contracted security officers. At that point, we contacted the Brentwood Police and they made the two arrests. Then we immediately changed every password used for accessing the vaults.

After reviewing internal policies and practices in an effort to help prevent this from happening again:

The two defective vaults were sent back to the manufacturer.

Contracted security officers are being rotated so that no two guards are assigned to work together on a regular basis, to prevent collusion.

We have fully cooperated with the Brentwood Police Department and continue to assist with the prosecution of this case.